


To pause and wonder, as sense comes flooding back

by EurydicaeQuercus



Series: Is this what a saviour looks like? [4]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, Cole (Dragon Age) Being Cole, Depression, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Mental Illness, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-27
Updated: 2019-07-27
Packaged: 2020-07-21 09:01:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19999333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EurydicaeQuercus/pseuds/EurydicaeQuercus
Summary: There are many times during her life as part of the Inquisition that Zaren Lavellan feels...alone. Unwanted. Overwhelmed by the choices that face her. But she never quite gives in. Not completely.





	To pause and wonder, as sense comes flooding back

A cold wind whipped through her hair as Zaren stared down at the steep slope of jagged rock that lay just outside the walls of Skyhold. The air seemed to freeze in her throat even as she breathed in, and she couldn’t stop herself from shivering, the icy wind stabbing her to the bone. She dug her fingers into the rough, ancient stone that lined the battlements, scratching them across the surface, though they were so numb she scarcely felt it.

Everything was numb.

Ever since Adamant, the world had been submerged in an unfeeling grey. The Wardens had nearly helped destroy Thedas. The thought made her sick to her stomach—she would have been sick, if she’d actually eaten anything that day. She trusted them, admired them. Of course, the person she most looked up to had nothing to do with this, and Zaren liked to think that if she’d have known she would have done something about it, but who could say that for sure?

Worries and doubts ate at her mind, leaving her sleepless. She had freed them, but at what cost? Thedas needed the Wardens, there was no question about that, but could she really trust them? After all they’d done? Could she really trust anyone in this cursed place?

She hated this. She wasn’t meant to be here, she should be back at the Clan, teaching the young ones how to master their magic, laughing with Arnumin, studying her scrolls and looking for more knowledge for the Clan. That was the life she was meant for, the life she’d spent so long coming to terms with after everything… And now it was gone.

She couldn’t make decisions like this, decisions that might shape the fate of Thedas! That had never been part of her plan. The idea she had to take account of even one person’s life, whether they lived or died, was terrifying enough. The idea of having so many at her feet, asking her for guidance when all she wanted to do was scream ‘I don’t know!’ was terrifying. None of this was meant for her. Sometimes she wondered if there might have been a cosmic mix-up, if one of the Gods had accidentally set her down a path meant for someone else—anyone else.

Her gaze never moved from the rocks below. It would be so easy to just...stop. Stop all of it. All she had to do was pull herself up, onto the battlements, swing her legs over the side and then...drop. It was a long enough drop. There would be only a second of pain if she did.

It wasn’t that she wanted to die exactly, she thought, as she lifted herself onto the wall. Or even that life was unlivable. She wasn’t hurt in any way. It would be easy to keep going through the motions. But something used to be there inside had vanished. Just like that. All she saw spreading out before her was months and years of pain, and terrible choice upon terrible choice as the Inquisition twisted itself up and out onto the population of Thedas, with all the anger and vengeance and horrors that such people who believed in ideals and not things could wreak.

If she could stop that...well. It was better than living.

The memories of that damned mirror didn’t help. He was long gone, had been for years now, but all the same, she found herself wondering what he would think of all of it. He would be better than her at this.

“Of course I wouldn’t,” said Maena, laughing and shaking his head. “Me? And my terrible jokes? They’d have killed me the moment I opened my mouth in that prison.”

A small smile crossed Zaren’s face.

“You’re calmer than I am,” she said, quietly, since she knew she was talking to nobody, really. “Better with people. You feel things properly—I can’t even feel anything right now and I sacrificed someone for the greater good just weeks ago. I _should_ feel things. But I don’t. What does that make me, that I can’t be sad about people’s deaths?”

“People you don’t know,” he pointed out, quietly.

“Why should that matter? They were still people.”

“Ren,” he said, and she felt a warm hand on her shoulder. “You aren’t a bad person. Anyone would have trouble processing the scale of destruction you’ve seen the past few months. Particularly someone who struggles with their emotions like you do. You’ve done nothing wrong—you’ve even helped save Thedas! You can be proud of that.”

Zaren laughed hollowly.

“I don’t even know how to go on living,” she said, and her voice was hoarse. “How can I command this many people—and people who only follow me because they believe in a delusion created to keep them under my control. Who will they go wandering to when I am dead? The templars? The Chantry? I shudder to think of these people under another’s control, Maena. They’re so...malleable.”

“Then be a good leader,” he said, as though that was nothing. “Teach them their fears of the unknown are foolish, like we are taught—like you teach your little ones. Teach them how to watch for such manipulations.”

For some reason, those words from the mouth of her brother, a spectre, but the only one she still trusted with all her soul, broke something within her. It was like the floodgates had collapsed and everything came rushing through at once, the grief, the anguish, the pain, and she began sobbing, curling up on the wall and burying her head in her knees.

It was too much! She couldn’t do it—she couldn’t save them all, she couldn’t teach them all! That the weight of the world rested on her shoulders, that she had a duty to these people who had lifted her up to where she loathed and feared to be, that she had to be the one who made things right—it hurt her more than a blade ever could.

“Hey,” whispered Maena, like he used to when she was a child. “It’s going to be alright. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“No,” she murmured, choking back her sobs just long enough to speak. “But you’re just a part of me. And I want to hurt me.”

“I’m whatever you want me to be,” he said, and she knew it was true.

“Then go,” she whispered, now not daring to raise her voice. “Go and don’t come back. I’m crazy enough as it is without talking to the dead.”

In her mind’s eye she saw him nod, then vanish, and she felt as though a warm, comforting presence had left her, no matter how false it might have been.

It was still icy cold up on the battlements, and the wind almost froze her tears to her face, even as she wiped them away. The ground still looked tempting, but the moment had passed, so instead she just sat. Far off in the distance, she could see tents stretching out across the plains, and smoke rising from the settlement below. There were so many people here. Uncountable people. And she was alone. 

* * *

Her breath hitched in her throat as she slumped to the floor and a sharp, jagged pain went lancing up her arm. Those damned Venatori!

One had gotten her, just as she’d been making to leave the servants’ quarters, taking her by surprise and landing a sharp blow on her arm with his blade. Unfortunately for him, he hadn’t been suspecting someone who for all intents and purposes looked like any other servant in the palace to burn him to a crisp. But he was gone, she was trapped in a cupboard while other Venatori prowled outside, and her arm _hurt_.

She could already feel the blood soaking into her clothes, and knew she’d have to conceal the wound as best she could before she tried going outside again. It was dark in the cupboard, but she didn’t dare illuminate her hands and draw the Venatori to her position. She’d have to fumble her way through this.

She peeled her sleeve back to expose the wound, biting back a hiss of pain as some skin came away with the cloth. If she were an even remotely useful person, she’d have learnt healing magic, and would have been able to deal with this situation in seconds. She was not, however, a useful person and her specialisation in offensive magic had never been more irritating. She rubbed the only healing salve she’d brought with her furiously into the cut, ignoring the pain as best she could and focusing on the anger. Anger was what would keep her alive tonight, after all.

When that was done she retrieved a bandage, and wrapped it around and around her arm, pulling it as tightly as she could in an effort to stop the bleeding. It wouldn’t completely stop it, she knew that, and already she was beginning to feel light-headed, but hopefully she wouldn’t bleed out now.

It was done. The wound was dealt with.

She could still hear metallic boots marching outside the cupboard, looking for her. Was anyone else here looking for her? Any of her so-called Inner Circle? No. And she knew this because that was how she’d intended it to be. The mission was secret, and she was in disguise, so if anything went wrong it was on her, and she’d _designed_ it like that...so why did she feel so alone?

None of it really made sense to her. She had a good grasp of history, of politics and the workings of the Orlesian Empire through reading book after book on the subject in the library, but that was different to living it. To having a hand in its future. And was she really the right person to be deciding all this? After all, like any person she was biased, and she could hardly ignore the fact she hated the Empire now she was supposedly to have a hand in choosing its new ruler.

If she had her way, Halamshiral, the Dales, all of their sacred places would be returned to them as they so rightfully should be. But she couldn’t do that. Because then about a hundred thousand people would probably kill her, and all the people who had just gotten their land back again. Because shems were evil. Which was another oversimplification, but who _cared?_ None of it truly mattered. One day the Empire would fall and their people, all of their people, would be forced to fight and fend for themselves as her people had for so long. Why not make that happen a little sooner?

As she sat in the darkness and thought, and listened to the boots outside which meant she couldn’t leave, she found herself growing more and more distant from what was going on. Maybe it was the numbing effect of the salve, or that the pain of her thoughts was drawing her away from the waking world, but either way, she found herself drifting. It would be easy enough to undo the bandage. To fall asleep and let death take her, then no one would find her, and none of these terrible questions would matter. It would be so easy…

But in her heart she knew she wouldn’t. Inaction had always been worse than doing something, however terrible it was. She _would_ do something. Decide on an answer to the impossible question. But not right now. For now, she would rest, and gather her thoughts, and hold herself together. For now, she could wait. 

* * *

She didn’t know why she was up here. The Herald’s Rest might be, of all the numerous places in Skyhold she disliked, one of the worst. She had been wandering around in a kind of half-conscious daze, beset by the desire to go _somewhere_ but not really sure where she wanted to go. She just had to move, to keep the thoughts from settling in.

They’d been haunting her more and more recently, though they’d always been there. Thoughts of death, of destruction and corruption. Thoughts she could never quite escape at Skyhold, the stronghold of the Inquisition’s power, and therefore the place where such thoughts were easy to brood over.

She felt like she ought to have noticed her feet were taking her inside the tavern, albeit, only the upstairs part, away from any actual patrons. The smell of alcohol and sweat was thick in the air, no matter how many flowers they put in the windows downstairs to try and mask it.

She found herself staring distantly at the spiralling staircase below, leading down into the tavern proper. What on earth was the point of all of this? She didn’t know what she was doing here. Doing anywhere, really. Wouldn’t it be easier to just…

“Are you going to jump?”

The unexpected voice from behind her gave her such a jolt she kicked back with magic completely impulsively, sending them flying across the room, and crumpling against the wall. Her heart stopped momentarily. Had anyone heard? Were they dead? Was she going to be killed for this? She stumbled towards the unfortunate creature in a panicky daze, trying to see if they were alright.

It was Cole—of course, he was always lurking up here. Her heart stopped hammering quite so rapidly. Cole was a spirit and while that didn’t mean he _couldn’t_ be hurt, he was less likely to have been permanently damaged by the magic. When she heard him wince, her head finally settled. He was alive, that was the important thing.

“Are you alright?” she asked, and she hated the way her voice was trembling.

“Yes,” he said, stumbling upright again, and rubbing his shoulder. “My head feels fuzzy, but that's only for now.”

“Right,” she said. She never really knew what to say to Cole.

“Your head is fuzzy too,” he said, as though stating a point of fact, “but it’s different to mine. It’s hard to see how hurt you are behind all the light. I don’t know how to help you.”

“I don’t need your help, Cole,” said Zaren, slightly relieved they were getting back onto a familiar topic. “What’s wrong with my head can’t be fixed with a few kind words and forgotten memories I’m afraid.”

“You might be right,” he said, nodding, sending his huge hat flapping. “It’s hard to help people with so many tangles. I can only unknot a few. And the rest always create more.”

“Yes, that’s...how it is. You’ve just got to live with it.”

“Can you live with it?”

Cole had the uncanny and unpleasant knack for hitting on topics Zaren really didn’t want to talk about, which was why she so often avoided talking to him. Still, they were having a conversation, and there was no need to be rude.

“That's still to be determined,” she said, glancing back at the door leading out of the tavern. “Please check back in later.”

“Well if you die then I won’t be able to check,” he pointed out, quite truthfully. “A lot of people would be upset if you died.”

“True,” she said, with a noncommittal shrug.

She knew she was being awkward, but fortunately Cole was an awkward being, so he didn’t mind too much.

“It’s strange,” he said, tilting his head, “sometimes you care a lot about what other people think of you, but sometimes you don’t care at all.”

“I’m funny like that,” she sighed, shaking her head. Cole wasn’t telling her anything she didn’t know already.

“You shouldn’t feel bad about it,” he said, as though deciding on something. “You are yourself, not what they want you to be. That is a good thing.”

“You...really think so?” asked Zaren, raising an eyebrow.

For her money that tended to be a pretty bad thing, if the reactions she got were any indication. And besides, it wasn’t like she shied away from the fact she was cruel. She knew that.

“Being yourself is not cruelty,” he said, and Zaren was reminded yet again of why she was never, ever going to go on a mission with him. Not because she disliked him, but because if he came out with things like that in front of anyone else she’d have a nervous breakdown. “Though sometimes you can be harsh with others. It might help you trust them if you stop seeing them as enemies.”

“Cole,” she sighed, because she knew he was right and her defence was useless, but she was going to use it anyway. “It is because people are people that I don’t trust them. People are fickle. Changeable. One moment they love you the next they don’t. Or they can simply pretend to like you while all the while manipulating you into your own destruction. Or sometimes they’re just deluded, or cruel. They aren’t worth the effort of trust. Not when they might hurt you.”

“What about the people you care about? The ones among the trees—the ones that sang to you, but in songs you understood. Why are they different to the people here?”

“They’re different,” said Zaren, speaking as she pieced together the parts in her mind, “because I know that if they hurt me I won’t be alone. There are always other people there, others that I trust to stand by my side. And if they all abandon me then...well. I trust their judgement.”

“Even if they think you’re bad?”

“ _Especially_ if they think I’m bad.”

“I see,” he said, though he was frowning. “You are very strange. But that’s not a bad thing.”

“If you say so, Cole,” she said, chuckling. 

She _was_ strange, of that there was no question, but it was nice to hear that someone else thought that was alright. Even if it was only one person, and a very strange person at that. But sometimes, one person was enough.


End file.
